while i hope that the negotiations to avert the fiscal cliff are successful, in my view we should not wait for a grand bargain in order to finish work on this important tax extender legislation. tax extenders are different from the other fiscal cliff issues for three basic reasons, and let me describe those reasons. first tax extenders are much less contentious than the other end of year problems that we -- that need to be resolved. the tax extender bill on the senate calendar has strong bipartisan support. in august, the finance committee approved it by a large margin. we have support from six republicans, including the ranking member, senator hatch. all 13 democrats supported it. i believe that many more republicans will vote for this legislation if it's brought up for consideration here in the senate. the bill consists entirely of tax cuts. it should not be difficult to get senators to vote for tax cuts, right before christmas especially. most of these tax cuts have solid bipartisan support. many of these tax cuts will help the economy, will help the middle class. for example, the